Al Khanzna- Day 7

Wow, what a day. I’m aching terribly at the moment.

I started the day with my first full meal in three days and it felt great. The hotel we stayed at was probably the nicest one so far; it had all the amenities, including a 5 star restaurant.

Breakfast was a buffet with all sorts of stuff, including fresh omlets and watermelon juice. Meredith joined me and we looked at the complimetary newspapers they had given us. In mine I read about the dissolution of the Hamas led coalition government in Palestine. Meredith read a story about a man in India who had just failed, for the 39th time a test he had been tring to pass so he could get a better job and a wife. The man was 79 years old and had no formal education. The only part of te test he was able to almost pass was ancient Sanskrit. He had a good chuckle over this.
After breakfast we did some internet stuff, then Jaber came to pick us up. We checked out, a bit ruefully on my part, and headed to Al Khazna where Jaber lived.

Jaber’s house and small town are situated about 30 or 40 minutes outside of Abu Dhabi. It seems like he is the officer who lives the closest to the actual Police headquarters where the work. Some of the other guys have to live in apartments in Abu Dhabi during the week. Apparently, this isn’t uncommon.

I was ushered into the main guest area and Jaber, pronounced Ya-ber by the way, took my sister and our companion Lynn to meet his wife, father, and others. I was actually pretty relieved that there weren’t a whole bunch of other people around; it was nice to chill out somewhere.

Jaber came back with his brother, Ahmed (pronounce by stressing the ahh, and putting a little ‘ch’ after it like ‘LOCH ness’—so its like ‘Och-med, just not too hard on the ‘ch’) We ate fruit drank some really great tea and watched Arabic music videos.

Jaber and I talked about some religiousy things. I definitely appreciate people with strong spiritual views, I like to hear how they understand and interperet things. I also have a lot to learn about Islam. I asked him about why it’s bad to be left handed, and he replied that it is not bad, just unlike Mohammed. There are things that have been ordered by god, things forbidden by god and things god wants us to do. For the rest, Muslims try to emulate the life of Mohammed—he was right handed, so they try to be right handed; his wives covered up, so their wives cover up.

After a bit Ahmed’s friend Khalifa (the ‘KH’ is said like you are almost gargling in the back of your throught, or maybe getting ready to hawk a loogie) came in. He spoke English pretty well, and we talked a bit. Meredith and Lynn joined us and we lunched. After lunch everyone left, we putzed around for a while and finally hit the road to do some horseback riding, and 4-wheeling on Khalifa’s ranch.

Before the ranch, though, we took a detour out deep into the desert. I thip part of the desert, the sand dunes were enormous and very breathtaking. Ahmed took the three of us in his truck and we went dune-cruising. It was very cool, almost like a roller coaster. We left the dune area, saw a small farm where some horses lived, then hit the road for Khalifa’s ranch.

The ranch was right off of some kind of highway and this is the first place we went to where they had dogs. Dogs, if you didn’t know, are considered unclean in Islam, and are pretty uncommon. They are really only kept outside and maybe for hunting and protection. Jaber said they were crazy, but I found them to be pretty funny and nice; heck I kind of like dogs, and when I snapped my fingers at one of them, she came running across the ranch to get some good ol’ lovin’.

Khalifa’s ranch-hand started prepping the 4-wheelers and getting one of the horses saddled. While the rest of us went into a small trailer for refreshments and air-conditioning. It was about 6pm now so the extreme midday heat had lost a bit of its edge.
By this point Rami, a different, younger guy from Northwestern, had joined us. He had been at the other Khalifa’s wedding and Jaber invited him along for some fun in the desert.

With the 4-wheelers prepped and ready, Jaber gave Rami instructions on how to use it and the two of them took off into the desert. After a while they came back and it was my turn to try.

Here in the UAE, safety rules, and maybe rules in general, are a little bit relaxed, so there were no helmets and pads. Just you, the machine, the wind, and the sand. I started out slowly, getting the feel for the gears and the clutch, and trying to find my comfort zone.

The only time I had done this before was when I was about 10, so I wanted to make sure I didn’t screw up. I was zipping along pretty good all day. I got the gears shifting down really quickly, as I am an experienced stick shift driver (pats own back) I did manage to jump a sand dune that had nothing on the other side and thus took a dive off of my vehicle. When I stood up and felt all my pieces in the right place I said a very heartfelt prayer of thanks--you would have too.

After the desert fun we took a detour to a campsite way in the middle of no where. One of the guys' friends owned this site and used it as a resort for tourists. They have Arabic style food, sheesha pipes and, best of all, a smoking hot belly dancer. This woman was unbelievable. Aside from the normal hip-shaking and spinning, she also did some death defying cane flinging. At one point she was doing her thing with the stick between her and some guy from the audience. Then she took the stick, had the man put his arms down, and whipped the stick all aorund his body without killing him. Very nice!

All the people there were staring at us because they were tourists, probably from Australia or something, and we showed up with not one, but 5 Emirates all in their traditional dress. It was basically like walking into some hot nightclub and getting the best seat and having the owner come out to sit with you. Tre Chic!

I'm telling you, you can't have a vacation like this on your own. We are so unbelievably lucky to know all these people.

After this we headed back to Khalifa's father's house for another traditional dinner. The cool thing about this guy is that he is an original bedouin and used to work with sheik Zayed, the founder of the UAE. He grteeted us with his traditional gun belt on, the kind that cross your body like one of the San People from Star Wars. Unbelieveably, he left and came back with two of them which he gave to Rami and myself. Look out Halloween!

Dinner was great, we had goat (again!) and bunch of other stuff. This time the goat head was in front of me so I had to open it. I tore the damned thing apart, but apparently I wasn't finished. On of Khalifa's brothers, Nassir, popped the brain out and hannded it to Meredith and I. We both took a bit of it much to the surprise of our hosts who thought we were too chicken. Then I ate half of the goat's tongue. Yes, I have now eaten brains and tongues. YUM! (They actually weren't that bad, but it was too hard to get over my bred disgust to eat the entire thing)

After dinner we took tea anc coffee (chai and cohua) and watche some videos Khalifa's father had made about the traditions of the UAE and the bedouin lifestyle. There were lots of gun spinning dances, and then a clip of Shiek Zyed hunting with his falcon. Finally the video showed us how the bedouins loaded their camels and trekked across the desert. Quite amazing. Khalifa and Nassir then started taking out the actual camel rugs and falncry gear that their family has used for the past 60 decades. Aparently, each item is worth 10s of thousands of dollars because no one makes them anymore. They are exquisite pieces of craftmanship and engineering. It was all very beautiful.

As we were leaving, I gave Kalifa and his brothers the only gift I really had which was my second to last Marvelkind CD. I told them to share it around so I could start booking tours in the middle east. They were really happy about it and kept asking me about the website and our myspace page and all that, so don't be surprised to see them in my network soon.

We got to our hotel in Sharjah really late and I fell into a nice, pain-killer induced sleep. (That fall in the desert didn't left me alive and unbroken, but not undented, mind you)